A blog in reviewal of all those good times had as a child in front of a glowing screen. Whether it be an old Mac, an old PC, Nintendo, or Sega...all brands, genres and skill-levels will be covered in detail. Were you a fan of NBA Jam? How about The Secret of Monkey Island? Or were you more of a Power Pete kind-of-guy?
No matter what your platform, this blog is for you.

Saturday, November 16, 2013

A Bit of Raptors: Primal Rage

HOW MANY BITS, MERCER? 5/8 BITS!

The other evening while my husband, Jerry, and I were watching The X Files, we came upon the episode about the kid who got struck by lighting and was then endowed with the ability to call down lightning whenever he wants. It had Jack Black in it. It was awesome. That doesn't have much to do with it, but in the background of the Arcade that Jack Black works in, I saw it. I saw Primal Rage, and dreamt about it that night—specifically beating one of my coworkers over and over again.

If you have not played this game and are a fan of 2D traditional Arcade fighters, I would recommend it. Here is an emulator for the Sega Genesis version which is a bit different from the Arcade version due to severe copy protection the original developers placed on the game. Despite that, there are still many people that think that this great game deserves another chance in the gaming world. Although many versions were created and may be created in the future, my personal favorite is the Arcade version.

Basically, the planet Earth has been decimated and reformed in the shape of a giant dragon's head, all humans are reduced to the mental facilities of neanderthals, and the ones that can still talk refer to this post-apocalyptic planet as Urth. Okay—if all of that doesn't reign you in instantly, here's some more: there are seven monsters that have crawled out of the depths of this broken planet, and are deified as Gods, both virtuous and destructive. Just like Mortal Kombat and other fighting games like it, you can then fight these beasts against each other in epic monster battles—the difference to me is the fact that you get to beat the shit out of your friends as DINOSAURS, for the most part.

The creatures that you can control are all meant to be Gods of specific elements of nature. There is Sauron, god of hunger; Talon, god of survival; Vertigo, the godDESS of insanity; Diablo, god of evil; Chaos, god of decay; Armadon, god of life; and Blizzard, god of virtue.If you ever played and enjoyed Rampage this game is similar (at least to me) in the sense that you get to control giant "mythic" monsters, and they are generally based around the trope of dinosaur/lizard, monkey, and werewolf. Though I think that Blizzard is technically a gorilla-swap with Chaos, I have always seen him as more "wolf-y" like an original version of Ralph.

The gameplay is a bit rough, given that this was released in 1994, but I think that the innovative plot and unique characters are what keep me coming back to this game. The controls are also pretty easy to pick up, as you will see if you play the emulation above. If you haven't played before, want to feel some nostalgia, or just want to see those janky, janky animation here's a video of the intro, the beasts' clips, and some of the fights:

I solidly recommend this for a fun timesuck, though obviously not for any longterm gameplay.